Emo Celtic advance to Round 2 of the cup

Birr side, Highfield United visited Emo Celtic on Sunday morning in the first round of the Division 3 Cup. Emo held a seemingly insurmountable four-goal lead from the first leg and qualified for Round 2, scoring four more in the home tie. 

It was a great contest between two in-form teams, with Highfield sitting second in Division 3 while Emo led the way in Division 3A. The scoreline perhaps flatters the home side somewhat, but the goals were of such a high quality that no one could argue the result. 

Emo Celtic 4 (4)

Highfield Utd 1 (0)

(Emo Celtic win 8-1 on Aggregate)

Emo opened the scoring in the 7th minute when Craig Langford got on the end of a lovely ball into the box from Ross Meredith. Langford settled himself with a touch and finished calmly into the bottom corner of Darren Brown's net.

Highfield had a prolonged period of possession after the goal, patiently building out from the back. Their big target man, Igor Zoina played an important role, powerfully holding up the ball and creating space for those around him. Their goal came in the 27th minute when Niall Gorman could only palm away a Dermot Sheils piledriver free kick, allowing Zoina to pounce.

A depleted Emo were down to the bare bones, missing a number of key players, most notably, Stephen Norton. Top-scorer Darren Strong normally plays up front but dropped back to midfield to shore things up. The hosts were ultra-compact in midfield and starved Highfield of any space or time on the ball. 

Emo regained the lead in the 34th minute when Niall Wheeler climbed highest at the back post to meet Langford’s free in with a great header into the top corner. 2-1 at half time.

The second half was a feisty affair with crunching tackles from both sides. Wheeler was having a hell of a battle in midfield with Highfield’s Danny Maher which seemed to put a target on the Emo man’s back. 

Highfield, resigned to defeat, completely lost their discipline and started flying in with some questionable challenges. They received four yellow cards in the space of twenty minutes – three of which for fouls on Wheeler. 

The fourth card was shown to David Downey for a very late challenge on Strong, who steadied himself to take the resultant free kick. He was 25 yards out, in a central position and hit a screamer of a shot past Brown, going in off the corner of the frame. 

But the hosts had one more piece of magic up their sleeves. With Highfield bombing forward, Chris Gleeson picked the ball up in his own box and ran the length of the field. He twice looked to have lost the ball but recovered both times, kept his composure and went around the keeper to score in the 87th minute. 

Emo played some lovely football at stages throughout the second half, happy to showcase their passing and creativity.